Senior Elder Tor Ves dropped the granite steps into the outer herb court with four inner-court guards fanned out behind him. Their iron-shod axe-spears were held at a low slanted that cut off the walkway stairs from the gravel yard. Behind them, Bel Sar—the seasoned Bronze staff keeper who had tested Seyun in the thirty-breath bowl ring the day before—walked down more slowly. His heavy staff was held upright at his side rather than leveled at the students.
“This assembly is adjourned!” Tor Ves barked, his consolidated Bronze breath rolling across the frost-covered gravel in a heavy, stifling wave designed to make the twelve- and fourteen-year-old base students bow their heads in gut submission. “Elder Hesh, you have convened an unapproved cold and exact disputation during the chartered auction hours, disclosed internal sick room records without council seal, and introduced unchecked heterodox breathing notes into the foundation class. You’ll surrender those documents and retire to the inner confinement court until the spring charter trial convenes!”
Up on the timber walkway, the visiting town apothecaries and Oran guild tax clerks didn’t close their notebooks. Several of them stepped closer to the railing. They watched intently to see how the sect leadership would handle a teacher whose only offense was proving a pulse error in daylight. Down on the gravel, fourteen-year-old Lin clutched Hesh’s handwritten pause sheet against her chest, stepping half behind sixteen-year-old Tarek as the two lead axe-spear guards approached the teacher’s stone.
